Samuel Sutcliffe, aged 29, of Rothwell, Leeds, has been sentenced to eight years and six months’ imprisonment at Worcester Crown Court after grooming a child through an online video game and subjecting her to sexual abuse across Hereford and Leeds.
The court heard that Sutcliffe first established contact with the child in 2021 through an online gaming environment. He subsequently added her on Facebook before migrating their communications to the messaging service WhatsApp, where he concealed his identity behind pseudonyms. Over the course of the interaction, Sutcliffe sent indecent photographs of himself to the victim and applied ongoing pressure to coerce her into arranging in-person meetings.
The illicit activity was brought to light after the girl vanished from her accommodation to meet Sutcliffe. Her carers raised an immediate alarm regarding her disappearance, prompting police units to launch a high-priority missing person investigation that culminated in officers locating the child and arresting Sutcliffe in Leeds.
Under UK legislation, all victims of sexual offences are protected by lifelong statutory anonymity.
Following legal proceedings at Worcester Crown Court, Sutcliffe was convicted on Friday 25 September of seven separate charges on the indictment. These comprised two counts of penetrative sexual activity with a child aged 13 to 15, one count of non-penetrative sexual activity, two counts of causing or inciting non-penetrative sexual activity, and two counts of taking an indecent photograph or pseudo-photograph of a child.
The trial judge imposed a custodial sentence of eight years and six months. Under statutory sentencing provisions governing determinate sentences of seven years or more for serious sexual offences, Sutcliffe will be required to serve two-thirds of his sentence in prison custody before becoming eligible for consideration for release on licence.
The court also made Sutcliffe subject to a 10-year Sexual Harm Prevention Order and ordered him to register on the Sex Offenders Register for a period of 10 years, alongside an order to pay a statutory victim surcharge of £190.
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